What did people really expect.

[Curtains]

5 minutes ago, RoyMac5 said:

But the problem with that theory is that bar one the better youngsters aren't ours. There could be no continuity or rebuilding.

BTW 'what did people really expect' - to be able to pass their opinions on DCFC without being pilloried for holding different to mainstream idieas.

I don’t like the fact that certain players are frozen out but isn’t that about budgets and new ideas and playing style Frank is introducing 

[RamNut]

4 minutes ago, RoyMac5 said:

But the problem with that theory is that bar one the better youngsters aren't ours. There could be no continuity or rebuilding.

BTW 'what did people really expect' - to be able to pass their opinions on DCFC without being pilloried for holding different to mainstream idieas.

I'm not sure of the benefit over playing other clubs youngsters, but it gives us a chance to sign them permanently. Personally i don't think any of them are good enough for their parent clubs. They are in bamford land. Still imagining that they will go back and get picked for the parent club. It won't happen. 

These are not senior pros with thick skin. These are sprogs who need a bit of support. 

[David]

Just now, Sparkle said:

No one was yesterday at the game but our vulnerabilities were their to see and to be balanced we are missing a lot of players who have proved to be very important- Davies Forsyth Lawrence Bennett 

We have had a lot of injuries this season which haven’t helped at all, Lampard has been labelled as a tinkerer but so far off my head we’ve had Forsyth ACL, Malone twice, Davies, Bogle missed a game through illness, Evans, Bryson, Mount, Bennett, Lawrence, Wilson, Marriott all missing games through injuries.

Not to mention suspensions of Johnson for biting a shirt, Lawrence also for getting sent off.

It’s pretty hard to put out a consistent team with so many injuries and the timing of our left back situation couldn’t have been worse, especially with Lowe who by all accounts has had a great time up at Aberdeen comes back with a hammy.

As always, worth applying some context to the situation. Hopefully we can try and keep hold of a fully fit squad in the second half of the season.

[GrimsbyRam]

1 hour ago, Curtains said:

Frank has to work within restrictions as regards our budget. 

I think he is doing well under the circumstances.

 

I am fully behind Frank and think given time he will progress us.  I would say between 6th and 10th is where we should be.  Even yesterday's game, despite how poor it was, was actually still more exciting than most of last season.

But do not blame the budget as it means nothing.  Look at Norwich, Sheff Utd this season, Cardiff last, Huddersfield, Burnley before that...

[Curtains]

1 minute ago, David said:

We have had a lot of injuries this season which haven’t helped at all, Lampard has been labelled as a tinkerer but so far off my head we’ve had Forsyth ACL, Malone twice, Davies, Bogle missed a game through illness, Evans, Bryson, Mount, Bennett, Lawrence, Wilson, Marriott all missing games through injuries.

Not to mention suspensions of Johnson for biting a shirt, Lawrence also for getting sent off.

It’s pretty hard to put out a consistent team with so many injuries and the timing of our left back situation couldn’t have been worse, especially with Lowe who by all accounts has had a great time up at Aberdeen comes back with a hammy.

As always, worth applying some context to the situation. Hopefully we can try and keep hold of a fully fit squad in the second half of the season.

Lowe has groin problem but you are right injuries are cutting deep. 

[RamNut]

9 minutes ago, Sparkle said:

No one was yesterday at the game but our vulnerabilities were their to see and to be balanced we are missing a lot of players who have proved to be very important- Davies Forsyth Lawrence Bennett 

Davies is history. He was only ever a short term growett signing.

fozzy is out until his contract expires.

lawrence is a growett signing who has never achieved anything for Derby, and won't unless the penny drops. 

Bennett has a chance, but suffers too many hamstring injuries possibly due to carrying too much heavy muscle.

 

[BaaLocks]

12 minutes ago, RamNut said:

Unless a team is good enough for top 2 then its not really ready for promotion. The play offs create false hope that a team is good enough to go up when - the reality is ? - that any such team would get shafted in thePrem. 

We will prob end up scrapping for 6th with a few others, to get a 1 in 4 chance to go up via the lottery.

forget it. 

This season should be about rebuilding and that means young players and that means mistakes. Therefore leave bogle alone, leave tomori alone, and stop agonising over every little wobble. 

Great post, and I agree with it all. The only problem is that when you have a team that is largely centred around loans it's like a big game of snakes and ladders where every May you slide back down towards the start all over again. That said, good luck getting any team out of this division without loans so you're pretty much destined to be a footballing version of Sisyphus (go on, Google it...). Every season for the past five or so we've been good but not quite good enough, then the loans have wished us all the best and we've had to start again.

Our challenge this season will be (if we don't make it - and I think the play offs almost the only option for us now) that we have some rebuilding needed in midfield - I think most would agree that two out of three of Bryson, Huddlestone or Johnson shouldn't be starting for us next season and with Butters off, plus questions hanging over FloJo and Thorne we're more than weak in that area once Mount and Wilson go home.

[David]

3 minutes ago, RamNut said:

I'm not sure of the benefit over playing other clubs youngsters, but it gives us a chance to sign them permanently. Personally i don't think any of them are good enough for their parent clubs. They are in bamford land. Still imagining that they will go back and get picked for the parent club. It won't happen. 

These are not senior pros with thick skin. These are sprogs who need a bit of support. 

On what we’ve seen so far I would agree, the Liverpool fans hype for Harry Wilson is over his wonder goals, which have been wonderful, but his all round game isn’t one that would be challenging to break up the Mane, Firminho and Salah front 3. If anything he would benefit from another full season out on loan next year, as would Mount who hasn’t quite hit the level which he started the season since returning from injury.

Both are not realistic permanent signings though, not yet, another season on loan possibly.

Tomori is one I would love to see us try and sign in the summer, don’t see that being totally unrealistic either. I don’t know the lad but you would hope he has his head screwed on and can see the benefit of moving on to a new home and play regular football, if he’s good enough for Chelsea’s first team he will make it there eventually.

Tomori doesn’t have the same “hype” that Mount and Wilson do, his loan has gone a little under the radar and if we can keep it that way and sneak a deal through that would be a quality signing for us going forward.

[angieram]

56 minutes ago, LazloW said:

It is the same every season.  People start off with realistic and reasonable expectations... it seems most on here thought we’d probably do well to get in the play offs, but would want to see some improvement in the style of football... most seem to recognise there would be ups and downs with a new rookie manager and a fair few new players.  All very sensible (even if we’ve had too many of these types of season lately).

A few months in and all that gets thrown out of the window.  When we lose (to a team doing very well AFAIK) it is a catastrophe, the manager, the players, the tea lady are all rubbish and want sacking.  It’s a modern football disease and it gets on my nerves.

Obviously we want to win every game and look good doing so, but that isn’t going to happen.  For some Man City are the best team the world has ever seen.  They just lost to Crystal Palace and Leicester!  Some perspective is required.  

This is so true. I think that I predicted 7th to 12th, and I try to remember that on days like yesterday. 

Our performance disappointed of course and when you are in the crowd it is gutting at the time. However, we need to put it into perspective, especially in light of the injuries and suspension. 

I think Lawrence, Forsyth and Bennett are all big misses. (Interestingly all players we are told aren't good enough!) Johnson maybe less so but I would have wanted to have his option against another bustling, physical side. Is he available for Norwich? 

It's interesting that our best games have been against top teams this season and these have given Mount and Wilson a chance to show their parent clubs what they can do and we have played some scintillating football at times.

But in other matches, whilst I admire the skills of Wilson, Mount and Tomori, they are loan players and I sometimes wonder if they leave that last ounce out there on the pitch? The former two are certainly getting targeted for a bit of a roughing up in most games and it may make them think twice about going for those fifty-fifty balls.

Have Lampard and Morris quite got the balance of the team right for that rough and tumble of the Championship or do they need to compomise their principle of playing football the right way a little to suit the needs of this division? 

It's a tough call either way. Glad I am not the one making it.

[Millenniumram]

I expected us to be about where we are, it’s a season of sorting out the mess made by appointing an anti football management and starting to rebuild the team. The problem is that performances aren’t improving like we might expect, in fact they seem to be getting worse and worse and don’t look like a team building towards anything. We don’t seem to have much identity, energy, creativity or anything and we look far too easy to beat in the process. That’s not to mention frank making a lot of the same errors, you could understand it to start with being a new manager, but the constant refusal to play Waghorn, trusting Bryson overly etc makes me concerned whether he can really hack it long term.

Its too early to be passing much judgement given next years team will probably be different again, but you do have to have slight concerns on the direction we’re headed imo, what we’ve witnessed in the most part this season doesn’t give me much hope.

[Mr Tibbs]

Performances the biggest frustration for me. 

We've not had one in the last 8 games, maybe 50/60 minutes against Swansea and we did our best to screw that up. Go back to the previous 8 before that and there is a stark contrast. Why? 

I think Lamps has played his part in the drop with the tinkering and we're not rectifying clear weaknesses which teams are exploiting time and time again. The press has gone, so has the midfield movement. Give Jack Marriott a sniff of a chance and he'll score, at the moment the best he's getting is lumped balls from the back when they're under pressure and there's no out ball. 

All hopefully a big learning curve and come May we can see some sort of improvement. At the half way point we've seen us peak and then drop off significantly. 

The budget thing is fake news, let's be reyt. 

[Alph]

Still happy with him but his tinkering gets on my nerves. 

I'd get it if we still saw the energy in our pressing but we don't. So what's the point?

I like his direction but I think the tinkering hinders people growing into their roles and partnerships. You look at the changes made for the Stoke game and if it was to keep players fresh for Forest or to bring in fresh players for Stoke then neither worked. Same in the last 2 games. The team looks more disjointed than fresh. We need to find that buzz we had v WBA, Boro etc

[Curtains]

36 minutes ago, Mr Tibbs said:

Performances the biggest frustration for me. 

We've not had one in the last 8 games, maybe 50/60 minutes against Swansea and we did our best to screw that up. Go back to the previous 8 before that and there is a stark contrast. Why? 

I think Lamps has played his part in the drop with the tinkering and we're not rectifying clear weaknesses which teams are exploiting time and time again. The press has gone, so has the midfield movement. Give Jack Marriott a sniff of a chance and he'll score, at the moment the best he's getting is lumped balls from the back when they're under pressure and there's no out ball. 

All hopefully a big learning curve and come May we can see some sort of improvement. At the half way point we've seen us peak and then drop off significantly. 

The budget thing is fake news, let's be reyt. 

The budget thing isn’t fake news lets be right.  

[Ramleicester]

11 minutes ago, Curtains said:

The budget thing isn’t fake news lets be right.  

You are right it is not fake news. I think to have coped with the squad he inherited and manipulate the limited financial resources he had to produce a top six side is amazing in the worlds most competitive league. It will not be until several big contracts and liabilities have run out that he will have the room to really create HIS team for the long term. I know it is hard given the recent history but fans need to give it a bit more time. The club now has a coaching and club management executive in place that cares about the next five to ten years and not interested in lining their own pockets or boosting personal reputations.

[RamNut]

Missing Will Hughes isn't fake news.

which idiot sold him?

[AdamRam]

2 hours ago, David said:

We have had a lot of injuries this season which haven’t helped at all, Lampard has been labelled as a tinkerer but so far off my head we’ve had Forsyth ACL, Malone twice, Davies, Bogle missed a game through illness, Evans, Bryson, Mount, Bennett, Lawrence, Wilson, Marriott all missing games through injuries.

Not to mention suspensions of Johnson for biting a shirt, Lawrence also for getting sent off.

It’s pretty hard to put out a consistent team with so many injuries and the timing of our left back situation couldn’t have been worse, especially with Lowe who by all accounts has had a great time up at Aberdeen comes back with a hammy.

As always, worth applying some context to the situation. Hopefully we can try and keep hold of a fully fit squad in the second half of the season.

I’m one of FLs biggest fans, think he has been a breath of fresh or both on and off the pitch, however even I’ll admit he has a habit of tinkering with the team. Yes he has had to deal with injuries, but he has often changed players and their positions, sometimes the players are  on the bench, sometimes even left out of the match day squad, and not because they are injured.

its great if it works, however you make yourself an easy target when it doesn’t.

 

[Mr Tibbs]

36 minutes ago, Curtains said:

The budget thing isn’t fake news lets be right.  

Come on then Curtains, tell me all about poor Frank and his Thatchers Britain budget conditions. 

 

 

[David]

Just now, AdamRam said:

I’m one of FLs biggest fans, think he has been a breath of fresh or both on and off the pitch, however even I’ll admit he has a habit of tinkering with the team. Yes he has had to deal with injuries, but he has often changed players and their positions, sometimes the players are  on the bench, sometimes even left out of the match day squad, and not because they are injured.

its great if it works, however you make yourself an easy target when it doesn’t.

I don’t see that to be honest, initial tinkering aside which has to be allowed with a new manger and team, changes have come mostly through suspension, injury or following a defeat/poor performance.

It can be a lose/lose situation, take the games following the cup ties we had. Change it and lose, shouldn’t have tinkered, doesn’t change it and why are we killing the players. Pretty sure if I look back at the match threads a few weeks ago there was calls to rest players as they look knackered.

Team selections can be a little like trial by media at times, take the Daily Mail with the front page headline named the couple morons before they were even charged, yesterday Waghorn may not have been fit enough to play the 90, how do we know without all the sports bra data.

When Lampard comes out and says it was a tactical decision to leave Waghorn out against Forest, that makes it easier to criticise, I would have had him in the team myself but there you go, but I think given the injuries and suspensions it’s a little harsh to call him a tinkerer right now.

 

[Curtains]

6 minutes ago, Mr Tibbs said:

Come on then Curtains, tell me all about poor Frank and his Thatchers Britain budget conditions. 

 

 

Sold Vydra and Wiemann for loads. 

[CornwallRam]

Well I expected him to get sacked by Christmas, so to me, he's doing really well.

He faces a big challenge now. We've got injury problems, our form has dipped, any or all of the loan players could go back and he's getting mardy at journalists. If he gets through the next few weeks he'll be a damn good manager. If he doesn't he'll be a pundit.